Of Apples and Assassins
by L'Artista Brilliante
Summary: .:Dust the apple off, savor each bite, and deep inside you know Adam was right:. A fanfiction based on the music meme that has been passed around this site. Rated T for language and slight blood. Ezio/Leonardo, Altair/Malik, and Desmond/Shaun


**So I was looking through some of my old stories that I had posted on earlier and then I realized that I haven't written anything in almost a year. I've been getting into Assassin's Creed lately (I just beat AC2 on the Xbox 360 about a week ago and am now in the middle of the Bonfire of the Vanities DLC), so I figured that I start over writing in a new section. Also, I'm a beta reader, so if you need any help with editing any stories, then please PM me!**

**This is my first fanfic for AC, so please be courteous! :)**

**BTW, I am a heavy shipper of EzioxLeonardo :P**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Assassin's Creed or any of the songs mentioned. If I had owned anything about AC2 besides a copy of the game, there would have been more hug moments between Ezio and Leonardo :P**

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**Rules:**

**Pick a character, pairing, or fandom you like.**

**Turn on your music player and put it on random/shuffle.**

**Write a drabble related to each song that plays. You only have the time frame of the song to finish the drabble; you start when the song starts, and stop when it's over. No lingering afterwards!**

**Do ten of these, then post them.**

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**1. Seize the Day – Avenged Sevenfold (5:32)**

"Ezio! How may I help you?"

The white-clad assassin had returned once again to his most trusted friend's workshop, tightly gripping a codex page. He held up the scroll for Leonardo to see.

"Ah!" Leonardo exclaimed, his eyes sparkling with enthusiasm as he received the page. "You found another one! How exciting!"

Leonardo turned around to look for any reply within Ezio's expression, but was taken offguard. Instead of the playful smirk the womanizer would chuckle, Ezio's eyes was dull with fatigue. His shiny, chocolate-brown eyes soiled and dulled, he gave out a muffled yawn as he stretched like a cat.

"Ezio?" Leonardo asked, touching his shoulder. "Are you okay, _amico mio_?"

"Ohh," Ezio breathed, twitching from Leonardo's change in emotion. "I'm fine." He then concluded his statement with another hearty yawn.

Leonardo sighed. "You should get some sleep."

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**2. Whereabouts Unknown – Rise Against (4:19)**

Another quiet night hushed the streets of Venezia. All the merchants had long ago closed up shop, and the only people who now roamed anywhere were the archers of the rooftops.

Every light coming from any residential building was extinguished, all except for one light in Leonardo's studio. A candle burned incense as Leonardo sketched quietly in the dark.

Pencil scratched against canvas, tracing invisible lines and following unknown paths. The pencil then paused at one spot.

Leonardo then glanced over at the spot of reference, who was snoring quietly in his bed.

Ezio.

Leonardo gave a small smile as he gazed at Ezio once more for advice on his piece, then continued drawing, without a word.

After a few hours, the full-body sketch was done. Leonardo stared at in awe at the wonder his own hands managed to create.

This was definitely one he was proud of to the point where he didn't want to show it to the world.

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**3. Check My Brain – Alice in Chains (3:57)**

"Altair!" Malik screamed. Once again his friend was nowhere to be found.

Malik pinched the space between his eyebrows with his remaining arm as he went up to Altair's room. He was still in there, playing with that blasted object?

Malik removed his hand from his head and began pounding on the door. "Altair!" he screamed again. "By Allah, open this door!"

To his surprise and shock, Altair opened the door within seconds. Malik was too surprised to tell his hand to stop knocking, and he accidentally socked Altair in the nose.

"Ah!" Altair cried, grabbing his nose.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Malik said. "I didn't know such a tough novice can be hurt by a simple tap in the nose." He grinned teasingly at Altair.

"Shut up." Altair croaked in a distorted voice (possibly from clinching his nose), blushing a scarlet red of embarrassment.

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**4. 21 Guns – Green Day (5:18)**

Desmond was having nightmares again.

He was running through the streets of Acre from Templar guards, running through the myriad crowds of people, and running to God knows where.

In fact, he was so engrossed from running away that he didn't even know what he was running from. Also, why was he even running in the first place? Desmond wanted to stop and ponder, but Altair didn't do what Desmond wished.

Suddenly, Altair tripped on air and fell out of the edge of the building right into a lake.

Altair screamed as his untrained limbs flailed with inexperience. Desmond knew how to swim, but goddammit, why wasn't he swimming?

He could feel Altair swallow in multiple gasps of water, and his lungs filled to the top with the liquid.

Then suddenly…He just couldn't breathe anymore.

"Wake up!"

Desmond was suddenly jolted awake (_awake?_) by a panicking Shaun.

"S-Shaun? What are you doing here?" Desmond asked, holding up his head as he felt a migraine suddenly creep in.

Shaun gave out a sigh of relief. "I thought I lost you there buddy," Shaun said, actually cracking out a smile.

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**5. Weight of the World – Evanescence (3:35)**

Another long set of days had passed by again. Desmond had just gotten off the Animus literally minutes ago and was taking a brief nap.

Lucy dragged her to her room of the safehouse to get ready to go to sleep. Though she would never say it out loud, she admitted that she was KNOCKED OUT.

As she walked into her bathroom, her vision suddenly went a dark blue tint. Lucy shrieked in shock as she saw images of her different ancestors walking by in front of her, all surrounded by an aqua-colored fire.

The former Abstergo worker tried shaking her head and pinching herself, but those images would not go away, even when she tried closing her eyes.

The last time the bleeding effect took over her vision was years ago. How come it's now coming back to her?

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**6. Breath – Breaking Benjamin (3:43)**

Leonardo was humming quietly to himself as he slaved away happily at his flying machine. He had just got done unpacking his studio merely half an hour ago, and now he was going to continue working on his invention.

Leonardo had selected a few tools from the top of his bookshelf, holding some of them close to his chest.

Leonardo turned around to walk to his flying machine when he almost ran into Ezio and literally jumped two feet, taken offguard. _Dio_ knew how long he was standing behind him!

"_Cristo_!" Leonardo screamed, frantically dropping his tools. "You keep on scaring me like this, you'll be the death of me!"

"Sorry Leonardo," Ezio apologized, grinning. "I just can't help it when I scare you."

"_Dio mio_…" Leonardo muttered to himself, eyeing the mess that he had just dropped on the ground. Ezio followed the trail of the artist's eyesight to the tools on the ground.

"Want me to help you with that?" Ezio asked.

"S-sure," Leonardo replied, his voice still shaky from the incident.

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**7. Bat Country – Avenged Sevenfold (5:10)**

There would be some days where Desmond would wake up from his trance in the Animus with this thirsty lust to kill.

It would affect him so much that he wasn't even aware about it. It was just the exhilarating thrill of being in his ancestor's footsteps that caused him to develop such a barbaric mentality.

Sometimes, at the last second, he would wake up from his hypnotic state and find that he was prowling behind Lucy with a kitchen knife while he spent his time out of the Animus. It disturbed him greatly.

It was a day like this where Desmond decided to take a break and decided, out of nowhere, to make himself a smoothie.

As the machine whined loudly from grinding the contents into pieces, Desmond suddenly heard something that wasn't part of the smoothie maker. Before he knew it, he had grabbed a knife again and put his back against the wall. He then waited and waited.

Suddenly, he heard the noise again. _Kill!_ his conscience screamed at him.

Desmond gave out a war-cry that he didn't even recognize as his own and charged at the source of the sound. However, it had turned out to be Shaun moving a basket.

"Jesus Christ!" Shaun screamed, dropping the basket. "What the hell is wrong with you?!"

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**8. Brompton Cocktail – Avenged Sevenfold (3:16)**

Desmond widened his eyes at the sudden sight of Shaun in front of him. He could do nothing but gape, then wonder why there was a kitchen knife aimed at Shaun's heart.

"I…" Desmond set the knife down at the counter instead of dropping it and risking the chance of it stabbing his foot. "I'm sorry," he finally managed to spit out before he turned around and bolted out of the kitchen.

Like Desmond, Shaun could only stand there and wonder. Suddenly, he recalled that Desmond was making a smoothie in the kitchen earlier and started towards the machine.

--

When Desmond finally awoke from a nap after that weird incident, he remembered that he had to go back into the Animus.

He opened his bedroom door to find a chair sitting right outside. Perched on the seat of the chair was his forgotten smoothie.

Desmond picked it up and realized that there was a Post-It note attached to the cup. He detached it and read the note. In neat, almost print-quality letters, the words "Apology accepted" flowed across the yellow, square piece of paper.

It was signed by Shaun.

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**9. Fade Away – Breaking Benjamin (3:15)**

Ezio scanned his new target area from the rooftop of a nearby building. The faint wind ran through his hood and tickled his stubby chin. From up high, Ezio activated his Eagle Vision, filling his sight with a dark blue tint.

His target shone out a golden yellow almost the second he turned on his Eagle Vision – and luckily he was right below the waiting assassin. The white-clad killer then retracted his hidden blade and leapt off the edge of the building.

_Too easy_, Ezio smirked to himself as his fall lead him closer and closer to his assassination target.

Or so he thought.

Right when he was about to feel the squirt of blood from nailing his target in the neck with his blade, the target…sidestepped out of the way?

Ezio braced himself for a landing the very last second and rolled with the ground to prevent any broken bones. However, the landing still gave him a brutal aching.

Right when he was about to recover, he felt something cold pierce his stomach from his back, followed by a warm liquid filling up the lower region of his shirt.

_N-no…_ Ezio thought to himself. _How could this happen_? He then went out of consciousness, the blood entirely drained from his head.

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**10. You – Breaking Benjamin (3:21)**

Shaun just couldn't take it anymore.

The pressure of being depended on for the history of all of the assignments was making close to breaking down. Plus that "goddamn wanker" Desmond would piss him off beyond all limits.

"Whatcha doing, Shaun?" Desmond asked innocently from behind him, breaking his train of thoughts.

That very moment was when Shaun's last string of patience was cut in half.

"Goddammit, Desmond!" Shaun yelled at him. "Can't you see I'm doing something productive here?! I'm actually working unlike you, who just lies down all day! I told you multiple times, leave me the fuck **alone**!" Shaun screamed and screamed at him until he had nothing to rant at him about.

After his temper tantrum, he found Desmond with a strange expression. It was shock, surprise, fear, and regret mixed into a concoction that made Desmond's softer side appear from inside of him.

"I-I'm sorry," Desmond whispered, throat scratchy. Then, like a frightened rabbit, he ran off to another room.

Then, Shaun realized with a painful regret from the moment that he saw a tear fall out of Desmond's eyes as he escaped that he shouldn't have had yelled at him.

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**Sorry for any slight OOC and lack of detail that came up in any of the drabbles! I honestly write better when I'm not being timed lol ^.^;**

**And in case you haven't noticed, I'm a huge fan of Avenged Sevenfold and Breaking Benjamin lol.**

**Please review and tell me what you think! :)**


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